In 2019 the Yellow Brick team identified a gap in information related to the Transition and Activation of new healthcare facilities and spaces. We challenged ourselves to fill this gap by writing a guide that could be leveraged by those tasked with the responsibility of leading a new facility activation project.
Pictured: The group of individuals who helped with the editing (NIHD members include front middle four, left to right: Christina Olivarria, Kelly Guzman, Kathy Stevenson and Lynn Aguilera).
Our first book- Transition and Activation Planning.
Simplifying the Complex: A guide to Transition and Activation Planning for Healthcare Construction Projects is the result of a year’s long effort by our team. Our goal was to create an easy-to-use guide that provides readers with the fundamentals of the transition, activation, and operational planning process and is essential for anyone involved in activating a new healthcare space. Meant to provide a straightforward planning roadmap, this guide tackles the high-risk and problem-prone strategic initiative of activating healthcare construction projects. Our team utilized project management experience from healthcare projects of varying sizes, scopes, and complexities to share best practices and to provide insight as to how to avoid common pitfalls through strategic planning.
This resource provides the framework required to establish a consistent process throughout the Transition and Activation Planning process, including project kickoff, budget development, building readiness, and people readiness. Each chapter guides the reader through the stages of the planning process and provides the tools necessary for implementing a successful project.
Silver linings of the pandemic.
Covid-19 disrupted our lives in early 2020 and we found ourselves on lockdown with the time that would have been spent traveling to see our clients. Our team decided to fast-track our 2021 goal of writing our next book, A Guide to Healthcare Facility Dress Rehearsal Simulation Planning to share our Dress Rehearsal process.
Dress Rehearsal (Day in the Life).
The Dress Rehearsal concept was conceived in 2009 when members of the Yellow Brick team were tasked with activating and licensing a new, 100-bed hospital in 90 days. Drawing upon industry experience, the team developed an interdisciplinary simulation program using scenarios to validate new workflow processes and the new space's functionality.
Over the years, Yellow Brick has refined the Dress Rehearsal program (also known as Day in the Life), incorporating best practices and lessons learned from facilitating more than 300 events conducted across North America. The book provides the reader a step-by-step framework to plan and coordinate Dress Rehearsal events for any size project and includes samples and tools developed by the Yellow Brick team to support Dress Rehearsal event coordination.
Our journey to publishing.
Although many may assume that the most arduous part of writing a book would be finishing it, a large hurdle that first needs to be cleared is finding a publisher to publish the book. We compiled a list of publishing houses that our team felt were aligned with our guide and began the process of sending out queries. Emerald Publishing was founded in 1967 to champion new ideas that would advance the research and practice of business and management. After initial conversations, our team agreed that Emerald was the right group to publish our book.
Begin with an outline and determine writing content and goals.
Writing the book was certainly not easy! We began with an outline of chapter topics that we agreed should be included in the book and assigned chapter authors. Conceptually this sounded like a great plan. In hindsight and lessons learned for book two, we should have developed a detailed outline, four pages versus one, with content to be included in each chapter to avoid overlap.
We discovered Grammarly https://app.grammarly.com to help us with our writing goals and to maintain consistency throughout the book. For book two, we began with a clear understanding of our audience. We targeted knowledgeable professionals in the healthcare industry. Next, we determined the formality of the book and agreed that a neutral format with restricted slang would allow casual and technical expressions often used in healthcare. We agreed that the book should be written in the third person, which was more difficult than any of us thought. Finally, we developed a glossary of terms to provide consistency with term use and when to capitalize or not.
Just write!
The hardest part of the writing process for me was getting started. I recommend carving out time where you can focus and be undisturbed. Being at your best helps the process but does not make it easy. Review your calendar and set internal due dates with either number of words or pages written. Don’t get caught up with making it perfect. The editing process can be brutal. The adage “You are your own worst enemy” certainly applies, but the editor can be equally as unforgiving, so just write! The final product feels like a masterpiece, but you’ll have lots of bumps and bruises along the way.
Identify internal editors.
For our first book, we assigned a partner to read and edit our chapter. This sounded like a good idea from a workload perspective, but in retrospect, it allowed inconsistency and overlap of content. For book two, we had one person review all chapters to provide consistent feedback. We met as a team to review the recommendations and validate terms, tense, anecdotal stories, and our inconsistent use of capitalization.
When we were finished with the writing and internal editing process, we had a final reader review of the book and glossary. The reader was an experienced English teacher, familiar with our work and process, but not a Healthcare professional or in our industry. This provided us with additional feedback to clarify topics, eliminate redundancies, and provide consistency in the naming conventions of our written content and tool naming.
You need a taskmaster and project plan.
As project managers, it was easy for us to develop a project plan. We selected our finish date and backward planned our timeline. Our project plan included a parallel process of chapter authors and tool developers. Milestones focused on completion dates and:
· First draft copy
· Internal editor review and comments
· Team review of comments
· Second draft copy
· Internal editor review and confirmation of tool use
· Third draft copy
· Final internal editor and tool placement
Due dates were very important! Our taskmaster sent us “friendly reminders” that our chapters were due. Parkinson's law of management "work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion” could not be more applicable as our authors submitted their chapters on the deadline. I highly recommend a project plan and taskmaster!
Working in black and white- tool development.
Another lesson learned from book one was related to our tools and figures. The book was published in black and white, and we use a lot of colors in our work. Our challenge was to develop and adapt the sample tools for the book, so they were readable and aesthetically pleasing. We used black, white, and shades of gray to display the various samples we wanted to use.
Working with the publisher.
Once you have finished your internal review with editors and image placement, you will need to work with the publisher. We used Emerald Publishing and they provide an outline and checklist of requirements. These include a title page, table of contents, list of tables and figures, abbreviations, list of contributors, foreword, acknowledgments, individual chapters, list of index terms, author biographies, and permission guidelines. You will go back and forth over content, revisions, and other updates. The emerald publishing process with recommended timelines is listed below.
Good luck! I am fortunate to work with a group of creative and talented colleagues who are willing to work hard and accept challenges such as “let’s write a book,” and who are willing to do it again. If you are an aspiring author, set your goals for publishing and start today. Feel free to reach out to me with any questions kguzman@consultyellowbrick.com.
ORDER: A guide to Healthcare Facility Dress Rehearsal Simulation Planning: Simplifying the Complex.